House passes demand for grants of Rs.109.87 crore for power

Minister for Electricity Aryadan Mohammed announced in the Assembly on Monday that load-shedding by the Kerala State Electricity Board (KSEB) would be withdrawn from June 27.

Replying to the debate on the demand for grants for Power, the Minister said the KSEB would have to continue purchase of power at high rates from the Kayamkulam power station to maintain supply.

Mr. Mohammed also announced that new municipalities would be brought under the power improvement scheme. Besides, 12 more municipalities would be brought under the voltage improvement scheme. At present, 43 municipalities and city Corporations were covered under the power improvement scheme.

The compensation for death by electrocution would be enhanced from Rs.1 lakh to Rs.5 lakh. Titles for land in the project area of hydel schemes would be given wherever it would not affect dam safety. Noting that interruption in power supply was increasing, the Minister said a scheme had been drawn up to prevent such interruptions by cutting branches of trees touching electric lines.

A committee would be formed with the local member of the Assembly as chairman to oversee the programme. Local representatives of people and representatives of political parties represented in the Assembly, and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) would be on the committee.

The KSEB would contribute Rs.10 lakh to fund the programme in each locality and MLAs could contribute Rs.5 lakh from the member’s local area development fund.

The corpus could be increased to Rs. 20 to Rs. 25 lakh with contributions from local bodies. Works would be carried out by the KSEB and local panchayat presidents could contact the chairman of the committee.

When Babu M. Palissery (CPI-M) criticised the move to put the responsibility for preventing power interruptions on the members of the House, Mr. Mohammed said joining the scheme was voluntary. After the Minister’s reply, the House passed the demand for grants of Rs. 109.87 crore for Power.